Cooking Phase Mechanics

Cooking Phase Mechanics

The Cooking Phase is where you transform your gathered ingredients into dishes for your catering job. You’ll flip dish cards to reveal mystery requirements, allocate your ingredients strategically, and roll to determine dish quality.

Phase Overview

Time Allocation: 30% of session (~13 minutes in a 45-minute session)

Goal: Successfully prepare the majority of required dishes to complete the job.

Setup

1. Determine number of dishes based on job tier:

   • 1★ jobs: 1 dish
   • 2★ jobs: 1-2 dishes
   • 3★ jobs: 2 dishes
   • 4★ jobs: 2-3 dishes
   • 5★ jobs: 3+ dishes

2. Shuffle the full deck (including face cards)

3. Draw and place cards face-down in a row (one per required dish)

4. Review your inventory from Exploration Phase

Dish Ingredients

Every dish has required ingredients from these categories:

• Protein (meat, fish, creatures)
• Vegetable (greens, roots, sides)
• Fruit (berries, produce)
• Spice (aromatics, seasonings)

Required ingredients must be present to attempt the dish (all or nothing).

Optional ingredients provide bonuses to your cooking roll:

• Each optional ingredient included adds +1 to your cooking roll
• Example: A dish requires 1 protein + 1 vegetable, with 1 fruit as optional. If you include the fruit, you get +1 to your roll.

Example: “Roasted Dragon Steak requires 2 proteins, 1 vegetable (optional: 1 spice for +1)“

Cooking Sequence

Step 1: Flip Dish Card

Flip the first face-down card to reveal the dish.

Check the Cooking Card Table (suit + number/face):

• Suit determines dish category (Hearts = desserts, Diamonds = entrees, etc.)
• Number/Face determines specific dish and ingredient requirements

Step 2: Check Your Ingredients

Do you have ALL required ingredients?

✅ YES → Proceed to Step 3 ❌ NO → Dish fails automatically. Mark it as failed, move to next card.

Important: Missing even ONE ingredient means the dish cannot be made. All or nothing.

Step 3: Mark Ingredients as Used

Cross off the used ingredients from your inventory. They’re gone.

Strategic choice: If you have multiple dishes, consider which ingredients to save for later!

Step 4: The Cooking Roll

Roll to determine dish quality:

Formula: d20 + Equipment Die + Bonus Dice

Components:

• d20: Base roll
• Equipment Die: d4 (starting) → upgradeable through progression (d6, d8, d10, d12)
• Bonus Dice: Spend bonus tokens earned during Exploration (+1d4 per token, also upgradeable)

Example Early Game: d20 + d4 (equipment) + 2d4 (spending 2 bonuses) = d20 + 3d4

Example Late Game: d20 + d12 (equipment) + 4d12 (spending 4 bonuses) = d20 + 5d12

Step 5: Determine Dish Quality

Compare your total roll to the quality tiers:

Special Results:

• Natural 1: Auto-fail regardless of modifiers. The dish is ruined in a comedic disaster. Describe what went hilariously wrong!
• Natural 20: Auto-success + Double Dish! You made TWO of this dish using the same ingredients. Counts as 2 successful dishes!

Record the dish quality (it will matter for Review Phase scoring).

Step 6: Repeat

Move to the next dish card and repeat steps 1-5 until all dishes are attempted or you run out of ingredients.

Exploration Bonuses

Earning Bonus Tokens

During the Exploration Phase, you earn bonus tokens that can be spent during cooking:

How to Earn:

• Roll “Yes and” (16-19) on an exploration roll → Earn 1 bonus token
• Roll Natural 20 on an exploration roll → Earn 1 bonus token

Track these with tally marks or physical tokens.

No cap: There’s no limit to how many bonuses you can earn (though playtesting may reveal a practical limit).

Spending Bonus Tokens

During cooking, you can spend bonus tokens on any dish:

• Declare how many bonuses you’re spending BEFORE rolling
• Each bonus adds +1d4 to your cooking roll (upgradeable through progression)
• Tokens are spent and removed once used

Strategic choice:

• Spread bonuses across all dishes for consistent quality?
• Stack bonuses on one dish to guarantee a 5-star masterpiece?
• Save bonuses for later dishes in case you need them?

Scoring

Job Success: Complete the majority of required dishes.

• 5 dishes required → Must successfully make 3+
• 3 dishes required → Must successfully make 2+
• 1 dish required → Must successfully make 1

Dish Quality: Higher quality dishes earn better reviews and rewards (see Review Phase).

Failed dishes (missing ingredients or Natural 1) don’t count toward completion.

Double dishes (Natural 20 result) count as TWO successful dishes!

Cooking Card Tables

Status: Not Yet Designed

Planned Structure:

• Suits determine dish category:
  • Hearts = Desserts
  • Diamonds = Entrees
  • Clubs = Soups/Stews
  • Spades = Appetizers
• Numbers/Faces determine specific dishes and ingredient requirements
• Face cards included (shuffle full deck, all cards are potential dishes)

Character Cooking Specialties

Status: To Be Determined

Currently, character specialties do NOT directly affect cooking rolls. All characters use the same cooking roll formula. Whether specialists should have cooking bonuses is an open design question for future sessions.

Progression & Upgrades

Equipment Die Upgrades:

• Starting: d4
• Upgrades: d6 → d8 → d10 → d12
• Represents better kitchen equipment (upgraded ovens, tools, etc.)

Bonus Die Upgrades:

• Starting: d4 per bonus token
• Upgrades: d6 → d8 → d10 → d12
• Represents character skill improvement

Cost and unlock requirements: To be determined in Progression Phase design.

Design Notes

Why This System Works:

• Card reveal creates uncertainty - you don’t know what you’ll need to cook until you flip
• Resource management puzzle - limited ingredients must be allocated wisely
• Rewards exploration success - “Yes and” rolls earn cooking bonuses
• Strategic choices - where to spend bonuses, which ingredients to use when
• Natural tension - can you make enough dishes with what you have?
• Scales with progression - equipment and skill upgrades make higher quality more achievable
• Maintains possibility space - 5-star dishes are possible early (rare) and common late (but not guaranteed)
• Fast-paced - 3-5 dishes × ~2 minutes per dish = fits 30% of session time

---

Design History (Archived)

Early Design Thinking

These were the original questions and ideas that led to the breakthrough:

• Base score for having required base/mid-level ingredients
• Quality of ingredients affects final dish quality
• Special/rare ingredients provide bonuses to final dish
• Need mechanics to reduce randomness - ways to put odds in player’s favor

Character Bonuses (Resolved)

• Originally thought character specialties should apply to cooking phase
• Current design: Character specialties may not be needed for cooking
• Exploration performance (earning bonus tokens) rewards good play instead

Open Questions (Resolved)

• ✅ What is the actual mechanical gameplay during cooking? Card-based dish reveal + cooking roll
• ✅ How do players interact with the ingredients they collected? Check if you have required ingredients, mark as used
• ✅ What decisions do players make during this phase? Which bonuses to spend, which ingredients to allocate
• ⏸️ How do character specialties manifest in cooking? TBD - may not be needed